


Hunter or Hunted

by AuroraRebellion



Category: Star Wars Legends - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Gen, Non-Consensual Touching, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Prompt: waking up restrained, Threatened sexual assualt; nothing happens but it's an undertone, Torture, Whump, Whumptober 2020, excessive use of star wars swears, zam wessel (star wars) is here but like not enough to tag
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-01
Updated: 2020-10-01
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:26:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,250
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26720608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AuroraRebellion/pseuds/AuroraRebellion
Summary: When the world slowly spins into focus, coming out of the darkness, he’s strapped to an interrogation table; interrogation table, dark room, his blasters and helmet on a stone shelf not even a meter away. Well within reach, if it weren’t for a small problem: his arms are spread out at his sides, pinned down at the wrists by metal bands. He struggles, they hold fast. Kriff.He technically has his legs free, but when he moves, tries to lift them-- oh shab, ow, that kriffing hurts. Maybe he tore something in his shoulder earlier, when he was being dogpiled.-While hunting down Komari Vosa, Jango gets to experience firsthand how the Bando-Goro treat potential new members.It's not exactly what one would call... fun.(A mostly unmodified retelling of certain events in Star Wars: Bounty Hunter.)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 6
Collections: Whumptober 2020





	Hunter or Hunted

**Author's Note:**

> Honestly wanted to explore this scene well before whumptober, so hooray for reasons to write it!

The karking _thing_ gets the drop on him, in the most literal sense- it leaps down from some old pillar, slams into his back and that staff is- _kark_ that’s not pleasant on the windpipe, _shab._

Jango throws the thing off, but it has a friend who replaces it on his back-- multiple friends, _kriff_ , they weigh more than he can handle without staggering, and it's a struggle to remain upright. Osik. The green flashing across his vision can't be good.

The first one is dancing around him. Shab’la bloody _chaakar'e_ where’s his karking flamethrower- His right leg gives; he crashes down and catches himself on his elbows. His legs are numb and his arms are following suit, the green’s getting brighter, chanting’s ringing through his internal speakers-

Whatever the hells they’re doing, he can’t kriffing _breathe._

When the world slowly spins into focus, coming out of the darkness, he’s strapped to an interrogation table; interrogation table, dark room, his blasters and helmet on a stone shelf not even a meter away. Well within reach, if it weren’t for a small problem: his arms are spread out at his sides, pinned down at the wrists by metal bands. He struggles, they hold fast. Kriff.

He technically has his legs free, but when he moves, tries to lift them-- oh _shab_ , ow, that kriffing _hurts._ Maybe he tore something in his shoulder earlier, when he was being dogpiled; his upper body won’t be taking his own weight like he just tried to make it do until he can get some bacta and probably ten hours of sleep.

So he’s alone, in the dark about what they’re going to do to him, and these restraints won’t be budging unless someone helps them along. He can’t reach any of the settings on his bracers. If his hands were tied _together_ it would all work splendidly, he designed some of the mechanisms specifically for such a thing, but he apparently hasn’t been strapped to a table in a kriffing _torture chamber_ with his arms out often enough to have made a convenient weapon for the occasion.

He knocks his head back against the metal just for the sensation and breathes out slowly. Yes, he’s restrained. He got caught. It’s alright; he’s survived capture before, and he’ll do it again. Just has to survive and bide his time- soon, he’ll be putting a bolt through Vosa’s head. Quite a lot of credits for the reward. He just has to survive until then.

Just has to… wait. There’s someone coming into the room. Two of the Bando-Goro, making those rasping crooning sounds they make at each other to communicate. He can’t figure out if they’re sentient enough for it to be anything more than the vague communication of animals. Maybe it’s a comfort thing.

He doesn’t actually _care,_ they can croon all they want, _he_ wants _out._ The restraints aren’t giving at all.

Kriff. They’ve gotten ahold of some sort of disc with a lot of twisted spikes on it, and they’re setting it up on a stand in front of the table he’s tied to. The tiny spires dance with red sparks. The table tips forward so his face is uncomfortably close, and the kriffing things keep making those gravelly noises-

Oh, _bikadin ni shebs_ that sounded a lot like something in a slave tongue, something like ‘ _it’ll be over soon_ ’ what the _hells-_

Sharp points and electricity find his skin, and though he won’t admit it later, he _screams._

-

Kriffing sithspit, if he’d known this was going to happen he would have let Montross go on ahead and be the perfect distraction. Kark. _Kark._ He’s still trembling as he gasps for air, letting his head drop because it’s too much energy to lift it if he doesn’t have to. Stars, he’s _exhausted._ The muscles in his neck are cramped, things in his upper back are burning, his throat is raw, the left side of his jaw is a fiery mess of definitely-not-clean cuts, his right shoulder _definitely_ has something wrong in a tendon somewhere… Kark. His vision’s swimming. And they’re recalibrating the thing _again._

The restraints still hold strong. No getting out. O- _sik._

...Someone’s laughing, he notes, from some corner of his brain that doesn't actually _care_ that he's being tortured. It’s a deep sort of chuckle, in the back of the throat, and it’s coming from some distance in front of him- echoing, getting closer. The air is chilling to ice, and it doesn’t do anything to soothe the way he feels like he’s on fire after what they’ve done to him; now he’s just freezing while he burns.

Kark him, his arms are _screaming_ at him as he braces his weight and lifts his head. A tall figure against the vaguely green light of the hallway’s end, but he can’t tell if that drift back and forth is because they’re prowling, hips swaying, or because he’s dangerously close to seeing double. He blinks hard to coerce his eyes into doing what he wants them to, and still finds he can’t make out much. Taller than him, probably, lean, definitely swaying their hips.

They come into more focus as they step out into the darkness, lit by the spindly beams of light slanting across the shelf his helmet and blasters are on. A shock of thick white hair, swept up to spike around their head, an outfit that would get them _killed_ the moment someone goes for death by blood loss. But he knows her, knows her face- she was on _Galdiraan._ Komari Vosa.

Get his hands free, he’ll get his vibroblade out and go for the obvious option. How nice would it be, to leave her to bleed out in the dirt, like how she left his men to die in the snow?

No. Just one bolt through her head. That would do.

She sighs, and he thinks she’s smiling- _that’s his buy’ce don’t kriffing touch it--_

“Ah, the blast helmet of a Mandalore warrior,” she drawls, and she runs two fingers across and down the visor like she has the right to touch any of it. “Something I’ve not seen since I was a Jedi.” She looks over at him, expression drawn into just the hint of a smirk like she _knows_ how he’s boiling at every single thing she does, like she knows and likes it. “I must have cut down twenty of your kind myself.”

The ice in the air is jagged and ringing like a klaxon on a crashing ship. _Danger, danger, danger._ He struggles against the restraints because nothing’s going to give but he feels he’s going to spiral into something that will get him killed if he doesn’t _fight._

She tosses the helmet back onto the shelf and wheels on him, baring her teeth; “Congratulations, bounty hunter. You _found_ me.”

The table slams back when she thrusts out a hand, taking him with it. The change in position is almost a relief, with how it takes the pressure off his arms, but the cons are far heavier than the pros in this situation; she's crowding in on him.

“Now tell me,” she straddles him, settling over his hips and putting a hand to the side of his head, and he can’t move his legs even though he’s trying, “ _Who hired you?_ ”

It’s a sharp strike of durasteel to his head. _Mindtricks._ He chokes on a growl as he jerks his head away from her touch, only for her other hand to smooth up the side of his neck and force him to look at her again as she rests the first hand firmly over his throat. It’s a struggle to breathe as he slams up every defense he can muster around his mind.

“ _Ah_.” Vosa won’t stop _touching_ him and each bit of contact of her skin on his makes him want to jump out of his own kriffing body. “The strong, silent type.” A finger trails down from his temple, over his cheek and along his jaw. Stop touching him _stop-_ “I like that.” A grin. Flash of teeth. Predator. “More of a challenge.”

Her hands trail down from his face to his armor- and that’s worse. He tries to wrench his hands free--still no use-- because if she finds out a way to remove all that while he’s still restrained- no. No, he’s not going to go there. She just rests her hands on the beskar and traces idle patterns.

“I once tried to resist,” she shares, like this is a casual story from long ago, and they’re just two space-farers passing the time on an Outer Rim transport, “But the Bando-Goro have-” a slight tilt of her head, a raise of a shoulder in a careless shrug as if her kriffing Force isn't trying to worm its way into his head, “Ways, of weakening your mind, and breaking your will.”

It’s like she owns him, the way she leans in, covers him up with her and laughs as she puts her lips to the shell of his ear- “Soon, you will be my _slave,_ bounty hunter.”

No.

_**No.** _

It’s a karking _cruiser_ of a mental attack she slams into his defenses and a wall shivers and things he _doesn’t want to remember_ come rushing in. He thrashes against it, wrenching at the restraints as if he can physically fight it all off, _let him go_ let him _go,_ he won’t, he _won’t_ , he won’t be a slave let alone _hers,_ never again he won’t be like the shells of people she’s broken others into--

(“Touched a nerve, did I?” Vosa remarks. He doesn’t hear her, not past the noise of an old slaver ship in his ears.)

The restraints are going to leave bruises from how he strains against them, his shoulder is protesting loudly and his head is spinning but the air in the room is unbreathably cold and sticky from Vosa’s presence. Get him out, he wants _out_ he wants to go back to Jaster’s ship, ~~and wait until Roz calls~~ and- ~~find his buir’s old cloak and wrap himself up in it like he did when he was little~~ _leave._

But Jaster’s ship is scrap, blown to bits with nothing left of it. Roz is dead. He’s tied down to a table with a dar’jetti trying to get into his head and he can’t stop shaking.

Vosa hums, long and pleased, as his struggling dies down and he tries to catch his breath. “Perhaps this won’t last as long as I thought.” Kark her. (If only he could make his voice cooperate so he could spit that out.)

...His head is pounding. With each new go she has at pulling him apart, she finds another foothold; another flaw in his defenses, and he doesn’t have the strength to sit here and rebuild rebuild rebuild as she taunts him, circles to find his weaknesses.

Then it stops, for a moment. Jango scrambles to brace himself.

“...Care to join us?” Vosa calls over her shoulder. He strains to see past her, to the doorway-

Zam. Zam--and what the ever-loving _hell_ s is she doing here?-- who aims her blaster at Vosa.

Vosa’s underlings lurch forward, but she holds up a hand and the ice in the air freezes around them, pushes them off to the sides as she motions. Zam holds her ground- shoots, twice in quick succession, and the two Bando-Goro go down with barely so much as a shriek.

Blaster aimed at Vosa. Blaster aimed at- him. He tilts his head back, then nods ever so slightly towards Vosa; he hopes she understands.

Maybe she does. She shifts her stance, unflinching as Vosa ignites her _two_ red lightsabers, and opens fire.

Next time he has to go against anything vaguely Jedi-like, he's bringing a Trandoshan _slug-thrower._ Let’s see a jetti deflect _that_ with their swords.

Zam takes a hit. She goes down, heel of her hand pressed to her shoulder as she scrambles back. He braces himself to see Zam die, and that bothers him more than it should _for stars sake she betrayed him_ but she also seems like he can predict her so she’s safer than most-

She shoots out his restraints. He’s free.

Vosa’s turning, ready to change that, but he’s already lunging for his blasters and he’s not so drained that he can’t ride an adrenaline high and out-shoot an ex-Jedi. She gives ground, backs up-

The shabuir goes _backflipping_ down the hall, deflecting blaster bolts and laughing all the while.

He’s going to kill her.

But first, Zam. He shoves one blaster into its holster, keeps the other available just to be safe, and tries not to stumble as he hurries over to her side. She groans as she tries to force herself up, and catches ahold of his arm when he moves to support her. ( _OW,_ complains his shoulder. K'atini. Keep moving.)

“Looks like she’s all yours,” Zam laments, a little too grim to be cheerful like she’s trying for, “We’re even now.” Jango hums and pushes her back down.

“Save your strength,” he tells her as he stands back up. “Stay here.”

The helmet is a comforting weight in his hands, and it’s an extra shield against the world when he puts it on his head again. The HUD lighting up is like a sign the worst is done. He takes a deep breath.

“Back in a minute,” he promises.

**Author's Note:**

> First Star Wars fic!! Wahoo  
> Mando'a Translations:  
> Shab- in this situation, 'fuck'  
> Osik- dung; shit  
> Chaakar'e- lowlives, criminals. General term of disdain and abuse  
> Bikadin ni shebs- 'stab me [with a broad blade, specifically] in the rear.' Bikadin taken from 'bikadinir;' to stab/run through with a broad blade.  
> Buy'ce- helmet  
> Buir- parent  
> Jetti- Jedi  
> Dar'jetti- no longer a Jedi; in this case, a Darksider  
> K'atini- "it's only pain."


End file.
